at the edge of our hope
by kearlyn
Summary: Captain Cassian Andor, head of the Jaeger Program's Strategic Analysis and Intelligence division, meets Ranger Bodhi Rook for the first time in the wake of the worst military disaster since the program's inception. scenes from a Bodhi/Cassian Pacific Rim AU written for Bassian/BodhiCassian Week and the Bassian Prompts Pacific Rim AU prompt
1. Day One: RecoveryPost Scarif AU

Captain Cassian Andor, head of the Jaeger Program's Strategic Analysis and Intelligence division, meets Ranger Bodhi Rook for the first time in the wake of the worst military disaster since the program's inception.

The PR mavens are spinning it as a glorious, heroic defeat against a Kaiju of unprecedented size and strength. But Cassian knows the truth isn't nearly so pretty or heroic. The Class 3 Kaiju Scarif may be dead, but the Jaeger Rogue One is also nearly completely destroyed and both her pilots are in the hospital, Jyn Erso from crush injuries suffered when she was dragged out of the conn pod and nearly drowned and Bodhi Rook from the mental assault of solo piloting.

At least they're both alive, Cassian tells himself as he slips through the hospital's halls. It could have been much worse.

Rook and Erso's room is easy to find. The two armed security officers standing outside the door are conspicuous, a visible deterrent to try to keep Ranger groupies from disturbing the heroes' recovery.

Cassian willingly surrenders his ID to the guards and waits patiently while they run a thorough check. They wave him through the door after a few minutes, and Cassian braces himself for the conversation he's about to have.

His first glimpse of Rook and Erso in person is quite different from the mythic heroes trumpeted by the press or even the strong, capable Rangers their files suggest.

The hospital bed makes Erso look even smaller than she actually is, and there's something discomfiting about the way she looks so pale and empty in her unconscious state. Rook, who also seemed so passionate and arrestingly beautiful in the footage Cassian has seen, looks just as empty, like there's been something irreparably broken inside him. He's sitting in a chair tucked in between the wall and Erso's bed, rocking gently. One hand clutches desperately at Erso's and the other flutters aimlessly, tugging at his hospital scrubs, drumming on his knee, twitching through his hair.

Cassian approaches slowly but makes sure that his boots make enough noise on the tile floor so as not to surprise Rook. The other man doesn't look up.

Cassian pauses at the edge of Erso's bed, looking across her still form to Rook, then settles into the other chair. Normally, he wouldn't let go of formality so easily in front of anyone, but he doesn't think Rook will respond well to someone looming over him.

"Ranger Rook," he says.

Rook twitches but doesn't look up. Now that he's closer, Cassian can see the man's mouth moving, repeating a phrase over and over under his breath. Cassian can't make out the words.

"Ranger Rook," he says again.

He doesn't sigh when he gets no response. He'd almost been expecting it. The medical report forwarded to his office had highlighted the extreme abnormalities in Rook's brain scans. The doctors had speculated that the scan had been the result of highly unusual electrical activity residual from the solo drift and physical damage caused both by said solo drift and the trauma of having his drift partner torn out of his mind.

They'd used the word _miracle_ when describing his survival.

"Bodhi," Cassian says gently, softening his voice to be as non-threatening as possible. "Bodhi, I need to know about Scarif."

Cassian isn't sure whether Rook's jerked response is because of his name or the Kaiju's. The ranger's head raises enough that his eyes meet Cassian's for a moment, then dart away.

"Ranger Rook, my name is Cassian Andor. I'm with—"

"Strategic Analysis and Intelligence," Rook says, words tripping over themselves as they tumble from his mouth. "I know. I read your reports."

Cassian blinks, taken aback. Of course he knows that his reports are available to the Jaeger pilots, but he's never met a pilot that actually _read_ them. Strategic analysis is not usually the milieu of men and women whose job it is to have fist fights with alien monsters while wearing 280 foot tall, 7000 ton metal suits of armor.

"I'm here to talk to you about the events surrounding the Scarif mission," Cassian says, choosing to ignore the (intriguing) tangent.

This time he knows that it's the Kaiju's name that makes Rook curl in on himself. He thinks for a moment that he's going to lose Rook to the mental distraction, but the man stays present.

"What do you need to know?" he asks.

Cassian ignores the tremble in his voice.

"What happened?" he says. "Why did it…" He trails off, trying to find a kind way to ask his question.

"Why did it kick our asses?" Rook asks.

Cassian blinks, surprised at the other man's fire. He nods.

Rook sighs. "It started like any other fight," he says. "Get in position. Make sure the civilians are evacuated. Wait for the Kaiju. Fight. It wasn't until…"

He pauses, swallows, and takes a deep breath.

"It wasn't until it tore off our arm that we knew something was different." He rubs at his left arm, though the skin is bare.

The burns from the drive suit are embedded into _Erso_ 's skin, but Rook must still feel the echo through the ghost drift. Cassian remembers that Rook and Erso's ghost drift has always been unusually strong for pilots that aren't blood related or having sex with each other.

"It was stronger than any Kaiju we've ever faced," Rook continued. "Not strong enough that Rogue One shouldn't have been able to handle it though. What got us was that it was _smart_. It wasn't fighting the Jaeger, it was fighting me and Jyn."

Cassian leans forward, suddenly alert. "You think it was aware of you as pilots?" he asks.

Rook nods, one firm incline of his head.

"Why else would it go after the conn pod?" he says.

"We've seen Kaiju go after conn pods before," Cassian says. He doesn't doubt Rook's conviction that there was something different about this attack, but he wants to see where Rook will take his theory.

Rook shakes his head. "Not like this," he says. "We've seen them try to crush conn pods, detach them, rake them apart. But this one… but _Scarif_ … it was trying to get inside. It peeled open the conn pod and reached in and yanked Jyn out. It was aiming for her. Us."

Cassian lets the words wash over his mind. It's a terrifying thought. The Kaiju have always been giant, destructive, horrifying monsters, but they've never seemed intelligent. The idea that they can think, can reason is bad. The idea that they know a Jaeger's weakness is her pilots… that's worse.

He's dragged out of his spiralling fears when Rook speaks again.

"One minute, Jyn was there. In my mind. Then she was gone." He swallows and Cassian can see his throat working. "It was the worst thing I've ever felt. I thought she was dead, but we were one mind and I thought… I thought I was dead with her."

There's a long, weighted pause. Cassian feels as if the whole world has gone silent.

Rook's next words come out as a whisper. "I'm still not sure we're not. Dead."

Cassian has to swallow himself and feels his heart ache for the other man. He knows theoretically, though not personally, how much drift partners mean to each other, and he can't imagine what it must be like to have half of you torn away like that.

"Have you ever drifted?" Rook asks suddenly, seeming to read the direction of Cassian's thoughts.

Cassian shakes his head. "No. I never found anyone compatible."

He doesn't know why he said that.

He doesn't normally tell people about his attempts to be a Ranger, preferring to keep his past hidden and his motivations mysterious. He doesn't let people see the little boy who lost his family in a Kaiju attack on Mexico City, who longed to strike back at the monsters that took everything from him. Who could never find someone who fit in his mind, someone he could share everything with, someone he could fight beside.

There's something about Bodhi Rook, though, that makes Cassian want to open his chest and show the other man his heart. He can't keep his mental distance from the man, no matter how much formality he tries to inject into the conversation.

He shakes the thoughts from his mind and looks up to find Rook — to find _Bodhi_ — focused intently on him.

"I hope you find what you need," Bodhi says. His gaze swings back to Erso's still face. "And that it doesn't get taken from you."

Impulsively, Cassian reaches across Erso's unconscious body to take Bodhi's free hand. The other man goes completely still, wide eyes jumping between Cassian's hand and his face. Cassian waits until Bodhi's eyes finally rise to meet his.

"You did good," he says firmly, squeezing Bodhi's hand gently. "And you're both going to be alright."

Bodhi doesn't say anything, but he squeezes Cassian's hand in return

They sit there in silence for a long time.


	2. Day Two: First Confession

Rangers Bodhi Rook and Jyn Erso arrive at the Yavin Shatterdome on a rainy Wednesday, bruised and aching and barely five hours after their frantic fight to keep the Kaiju Eadu from destroying Sydney. The ghost drift is still humming between them, so Jyn doesn't need to see Bodhi trip over his own feet to know that it happens when he spots Captain Cassian Andor waiting for them under the marginal shelter of an overhang.

And Bodhi doesn't need to be looking at his sister-in-all-but-blood to feel her bubbling amusement and gentle mockery echoing across the link between them.

He ignores her, but can't stop the jittery, nervous feeling that fills him up.

You're a Ranger, he tells himself. You fight Kaiju for a living. One man should not make you nervous. No matter how kind he is. Or how pretty.

Across the ghost drift, he feels a gentle swell of feeling from Jyn, her way of saying _you got this_ without words. He shoots her a grateful smile. For all her teasing, Jyn has always been a rock Bodhi could cling too when he couldn't find his way.

Especially in the aftermath of Scarif. It's been years, but that fateful battle had left lingering scars.

He shakes those thoughts away. It's a good day, he and his sister are fine, the Kaiju is dead, and he gets to see Cassian Andor again. There's no need to dwell on a painful past.

He forces himself to keep his head high as he and Jyn stride across the rain-soaked helicopter pad, but can't stop the nervous flutter of his fingers. It's another thing that has stayed with him since Scarif.

"Captain Andor," he says as soon as he and Jyn are also tucked under the overhang.

He hopes he isn't blushing.

"Ranger Rook. Ranger Erso," Cassian says. "Welcome to Yavin."

(Bodhi may get a little thrill that Cassian always greets him first. The captain is the only one who does that. Most people notice fiery, outspoken Jyn before they notice Bodhi.)

Jyn snorts. "We're glad at least someone still has a working brain about this Kaiju mess."

Cassian says nothing. The tightening of his mouth is the only outward indication that he agrees with Jyn's statement. But Bodhi thinks he knows the other man well enough from their brief meetings over the years to know that Cassian is just as frustrated as the few surviving Jaeger pilots with the Council's tendency to bury their heads in the sand about the Kaiju threat and the necessity of the Jaeger program.

They'd decided _a Wall_ would be adequate protection, for goodness sake, Bodhi thinks. If it had accomplished nothing else, at least the fight in Sydney Harbor should have convinced them of the foolishness of _that_ idea.

Bodhi surfaces from his thoughts to find Cassian staring at him intently. He sees the captain's eyes flick down then rapidly back up, and looks down himself. He's still wearing his drive suit, having barely had time to pack his belongings before he and Jyn were rushed to Yavin. There's nothing wrong with the suit that he can see, so he doesn't know why Cassian is staring, unless it's because the other man has never actually seen Bodhi in the suit before, but what—

He catches the look in Cassian's eyes and feels Jyn's laughing nudge over the ghost drift.

Well, he thinks, well well, and feels warm inside. He'd never, in his wildest dreams, imagined that Cassian might be… _interested_. No matter what Jyn teased.

Cassian is still staring.

Out of the corner of his eye he sees Jyn look between them with a smug smirk on her lips.

"I think I'll go find something to do while you two… catch up," she says and walks off with a distinct swagger.

Bodhi ducks his head at the insinuation in his sister's voice and hopes Cassian can't see that heat on his cheeks.

"You know she's just going to go yell at General Draven about the disaster of the Wall?" Bodhi says, trying to shift the conversation to safer topics. He steps further under the overhang and leans against the wall at Cassian's side.

Cassian nods and Bodhi is fascinated by the way laughter shows in his eyes even when his face remains perfectly still and composed. He smiles back at the captain and contemplates the unexpected revelation that Cassian might be interested in him as more than friends.

The silence between them stretches, but not uncomfortably. The rain just a few feet away is a soothing counterpoint to Bodhi's churning thoughts.

Does he dare?

He sneaks a sideways glance and is captivated by the play of shadows over the lines of Cassian's face. He swallows and feels a flutter of nerves in his stomach.

"Cassian?" he says.

Cassian turns to him, a question in his dark eyes.

"Would you like to get coffee with me? On a date?" he says in a rush of words.

Cassian blinks, then smiles.

"I would love to," he says.


	3. Day Three: Happy Endings (?)

Cassian doesn't think he's ever been more frightened in his entire life, and there's absolutely nothing he can do about it. The fate of the world is in the hands of a couple Jaegers and their pilots 36,000 feet below the ocean's surface.

The operations center is crowded with personnel, from General Draven and the other officers to whatever Jaeger tech and base personnel can squeeze into the room.

Despite the crowd, the room is nearly silent and the tension is thick in the air.

Of the two Jaegers they sent down into the Breach, only Rogue One remains. Spirit Guardian was damaged fighting off the Class 4 Kaiju Garrison, then destroyed when a second Kaiju, their first Class 5 and code named Death Star, emerged from the Breach. There's no word yet on Guardian's pilots, Baze Malbus and Chirrut Imwe, but they haven't detected any escape pods and Cassian has a bad feeling they won't find survivors.

They haven't had any word from Rogue One yet either since the damaged Jaeger plunged into the Breach with Death Star thrashing in its grip.

Cassian's attention is focused intently on the LOCCENT operator who's frantically scanning every available channel and trying to boost their sensors to get some indication of the status of Rogue One.

Suddenly the speakers fill with sound, a screeching static that has everyone wincing.

"… successfully … Breach … Repeat. Rogue One … crossed … anyone hear me? … Bodhi … unconscious …ejecting … read? … damaged … detonate manually … don't … make it ... LOCCENT, do … copy?"

The words are faint and the message is garbled by static, but the voice is unmistakeably Jyn Erso's and it's clear at least that Rogue One has made it into the Breach.

Even as a muted cheer goes through the room — rapidly cut off by Draven's stern glare — Cassian can't release his white-knuckled grip on the console behind him. Erso had said that Bodhi was unconscious, and Cassian can't help but fear the worst.

They're teetering on the edge of their last chance of beating back the Kaiju, and all Cassian can think about is the fate of one pilot.

Cassian hadn't expected Bodhi Rook to come to mean so much to him so quickly, but once they'd finally admitted their mutual feelings, Cassian had been helpless to stop his headlong plunge. (And, quite frankly, hadn't wanted to.) In these last precious days before the assault on the Breach, he's grown so much closer to Bodhi and found his heart so entangled with the other man.

He's not sure what he'll do if Bodhi doesn't make it.

Over the roaring of his worried thoughts he hears the LOCCENT officer's determined attempts to raise Rogue One.

"Rogue One, we hear you. Do you copy? Come in Rogue One."

Only static greets them.

Cassian watches the screens monitoring the Breach with singular focus, and only moments later sees a signal emerging from the Breach. The LOCCENT officer sees it only a second after Cassian.

"We have a pod," he shouts. "An escape pod from Rogue One!"

Bodhi, Cassian thinks, tracking the pod with his eyes. In the background, he can hear Draven issuing sharp orders for the deployment of search and rescue helicopters.

He's interrupted by a sudden shouting from the LOCCENT officer.

"Sensors reporting a massive explosion of energy! The Breach is destabilizing!"

Everyone's attention snaps to the monitors, watching with bated breath as the holographic representation of the Breach shivers, then collapses in on itself.

"Can you confirm?" Draven snaps.

The room roils with barely contained energy as the LOCCENT officers frantically confer and check their monitors and sensors.

"Confirmed," one of them says finally. "The Breach is closed."

There's a moment of utter silence, then an explosion of noise as the room bursts into applause and cheers. Cassian finds himself buried under a crowd of dancing Jaeger techs. The crowd spills into the hallway and Cassian barely manages to extract himself before he's carried off.

He too feels the bubble of euphoria rising in his chest. They've done it. The works of decades is over. The Breach is sealed. _Rogue One did it._

And as soon as Bodhi is back safely, he'll be happy to join the party.

Until then it just won't feel right.

He winds his way back to the operations center and sets to work. He works through the beginning of the party on base, sending out notifications to the Council and other world leaders. He works through the fireworks nearby Yavin City sets off in celebration, coordinating a recovery and reconnaissance mission for the now-closed Breach. He works until he receives word that the search and rescue helicopters are on their final approach to the shatterdome.

And when Bodhi, shaking and dazed, is helped off the rescue helicopter Cassian is there to sweep the other man into his arms, press kisses to his forehead, and hold him close as he trembles. Cassian doesn't care that Draven and half the base are watching from only a few feet away.

Bodhi is alive and here and that's all Cassian needs.


	4. Day Four: Helping with Depression

Three days after the Breach is sealed, Cassian knocks on Bodhi's door when the other man misses their lunch date. He's starting to get worried about Bodhi. Since the final battle, the pilot has been quiet and withdrawn. He still welcomes Cassian in his space — turns to the captain whenever he can — but he seems disconnected from the rest of the world. It reminds Cassian of their first meeting in the hospital, and the captain, who's seen many soldiers fall apart in the wake of trauma on the battlefield, fears that Bodhi has finally reached the end of his strength.

When there is no reply, Cassian gently tests the door handle. The door opens under his hands but the room beyond it is dark. Cassian thinks for a moment that Bodhi isn't there. Then the light from the hallway illuminates the shape of a body huddled under the blanks on the bunk.

"Bodhi," Cassian calls gently.

Bodhi doesn't move, and Cassian feels a lump of fear settle in his throat.

He crosses the room in three long strides and crouches at the edge of the bunk. Bodhi is laying with his back to the door and the blankets pulled up over his face, but after a long moment Cassian can see the gently rise and fall of Bodhi's shoulders as he breathes.

"Bodhi," he calls again softly.

Cassian debates for a moment before reaching out a hand to lay gently on Bodhi's shoulder. He knows many pilots — many shoulders — react badly to being startled from sleep, but he (still) needs the physical reassurance that Bodhi is there.

Bodhi doesn't startle, but he does lean subtly into Cassian's hand, as he always does when Cassian initiates contact.

Cassian stays crouched for a moment, but when Bodhi doesn't move further, he decides to let the pilot sleep. He's walking quietly towards the door, when Bodhi's voice rises out of the darkness.

"Don't leave."

Cassian stops and turns back. Bodhi hasn't moved, but the line of his shoulders looks stiffer.

"Please," Bodhi says. "Don't go. Don't leave me alone."

Cassian crosses back to his side and sits gingerly on the edge of the bunk. Bodhi still doesn't turn to look at him.

"What do you need?" Cassian asks softly.

"Just… stay," Bodhi says. He shifts closer to the wall, a silent invitation for Cassian to join him.

Cassian toes off his boots and stretches out beside Bodhi. He tentatively wraps his arms around Bodhi's waist, unsure whether the other man will accept his comfort. But Bodhi burrows immediately into Cassian's embrace. In the dark room, lit only by a sliver of light from the hallway, the only sound is their mingled breathing.

"I don't want her to be gone," Bodhi says, voice so soft Cassian has to strain to hear him. "I never expected her to be gone."

Cassian tightens his arms around Bodhi, the only comfort he can offer for the man's missing co-pilot.

There'd been hope, in few hours after the Breach was sealed, that Jyn Erso would be found alive. There'd been an intermittent signal that might have been one of Rogue One's escape pods, but not matter where and how hard they looked, they hadn't found anything.

Bodhi had retreated further and further with every hour, visibly resigning himself to losing Jyn — again.

"I don't want to be alone," Bodhi says, soft and plaintive.

Cassian swallows a lump in his throat. "I'm here," he says.

It's all he can offer. He hopes it will be enough.


	5. Day Five: Force-Sensitive Bodhi

Five days after the fall of Rogue One and the destruction of the Breach, Bodhi is still having dreams about his co-pilot.

It doesn't surprise him.

His nightmares have always been about losing Jyn. About her being torn away, falling, dying.

About him not being good enough.

About her blaming him.

Those are the nightmares that have been with him since the first time they got in the conn pod together, given shape and strength in the wake of Scarif.

But those are not the dreams he's having now.

 _It's dark and cold and they can't see anything but they know the space is small. He is there and she is there and they are there together, as one in the drift. She is scared._

 _Bodhi. Bodhi come find me._

He wakes with the words tugging at his mind and has to sit in bed for long moments, breathing deliberately to calm his racing heart. He presses a palm against his chest and tangles his other hand in his hair, and struggles to regain his equilibrium.

The dreams _ache_ in a way his nightmares never have.

They ache like those first drifts when he and Jyn went from separate to together, when they stumbled out of the conn pod with minds suddenly twice as full as they had been going in. They ache like the aftermath of a long drift, when two pilots struggle to sort themselves into their own heads. They ache like the ghost drift, snapping between them when they have trouble distinguishing my thought from your thought.

Bodhi sighs and presses both palms over his eyes.

He tells himself he'll get over it, that the dreams will fade eventually, but even he doesn't believe it.

A knock on the door pulls him from his thoughts.

 _Cassian_ , he thinks and his heart lifts. He calls for the other man to enter and is rewarded by Cassian's head poking around the door.

The captain frowns when he sees Bodhi still sitting in the tangle of sheets.

"You alright?" he asks.

Bodhi nods. "I'm… getting there," he says.

He would like to say he's fine. He knows the last few days have been difficult and he knows Cassian worries about him. He'd like to be able to reassure Cassian that things were getting better (even if they're not), but he can't bring himself to lie to the other man. (Cassian would know, anyways.)

Cassian crosses the room and tucks himself against Bodhi's side.

"Just remember," he says, "whatever you need, I'm here."

Bodhi nods and leans his head against Cassian's shoulder.

"I know," he says.

They sit in silence for a long moment before Cassian gently pulls away.

"We do have to go to the meeting," he says apologetically.

Bodhi sighs but pulls himself out of bed and grabs a clean uniform out of his dresser.

"Do you know what the meeting is about?" he asks.

Cassian nods and Bodhi can't read the expression on his face.

"Draven just briefed me," he says.

"Any hints?" Bodhi asks.

Cassian hesitates, clearly conflicted, and Bodhi is about to retract the question when the other man sighs and reaches out to clasp Bodhi's wrist.

"I can't tell you," he says, "but… it might be good news."

Bodhi has no idea what this could possibly mean, but trusts Cassian's judgment. He straightens his jacket and gestures towards the door.

As the pair head through the halls of the shatterdome together, Bodhi tries to force the dreams from his mind. He needs to focus on the here and now.

But the feeling of urgency, the need to _go look_ , the echo of Jyn presses on him all the way to the operations center.

The meeting opens with the usual platitudes and updates, very little of which is directly relevant to Bodhi. As the last surviving Jaeger pilot, he's expected to be at all these meetings, but that doesn't mean he has much to contribute. There's talk of rebuilding the Jaeger fleet, just in case, and of turning their military uses into civilian applications. Bodhi knows he will be needed in the training of new Rangers, but that's still a long way in the future.

He pays more attention when the talk turns to the recovery efforts still taking place at the site of the now-closed Breach. Crews have been working the ocean floor for days, attempting to recover whatever they can of both the destroyed Jaegers and of the Kaiju carcases — the Jaegers for salvage (and to lay their lost crews to rest) and the Kaiju to keep their toxic blood from spreading any further.

Bodhi's been trying to keep updated on the search, as much as he can tolerate, so he knows that only yesterday they recovered scraps from Spirit Guardian's conn pod.

But right now, the tech is talking about some sort of signal they discovered while reanalyzing the data from the last run on the Breach, and Bodhi doesn't know where this is going, but something is telling him that it's important.

"Please," one of the Council demands, "speak plainly. What does this signal mean?"

The LOCCENT officer looks to General Draven and the general leans forward in his chair.

"There's a possibility that the signal was from the second of Rogue One's escape pods," Draven says.

There's a rush of sound that part the voices of the shocked men and women in the room and part the rush of blood in Bodhi's ears, and there's a stunned and distant part of him that just _knows_. The dreams come to him in a rush and he _knows_ that they're not just dreams. They're _Jyn_.

He hesitates for only a moment, feeling the weight of the power of the men and women in the room, but if there's a _chance_ Jyn is alive, he knows he has to speak.

"I… I've been having dreams," he says. The room goes silent and all attention turns to him. "Of Jyn. That she's out there. That she needs us to come find her. I think it's the ghost drift. I think you're right. It is the pod from Rogue One. She's alive. And I can find her."

The words dry up and Bodhi feels his hands tremble from the adrenaline.

General Draven looks skeptical, frowning even as disbelieving mutters emerge from around the room.

"It's possible," Cassian says. His voice cuts through the babble, silencing the room. "The signal is a close match to that of a Rogue One escape pod, and if it is a pod, then Erso could be alive. Ranger Rook and Ranger Erso have always had an unusually strong ghost drift. If he says that she's alive and that he can find her, I believe it."

The debate echoes around the room, but Bodhi only has eyes for Cassian. He offers Bodhi a tiny smile, but it makes Bodhi feel infinitely better. If Cassian believes him, then anything is possible.

Mon Mothma's voice snaps his attention back to the rest of the room.

"Well," she says, "as fantastical as it sounds, if Ranger Rook and Captain Andor both believe it's possible, then I believe it is our duty to try."

She turns to gaze to Bodhi; her eyes bore into him and he feels like a bug caught under a magnifying class.

"Bring our Ranger home," she says.

Bodhi can only nod, and can't begin to breathe again until the Council drifts out of the room. He feels a hand on his elbow and turns to meet Cassian's gaze.

"Let's go get her," he says.

Bodhi smiles and feels lighter than he has in days. For the first time, he reaches out to the spot in his mind where he sister has always lived.

 _We're coming_.

Nine hours later, Bodhi leads the rescue helicopters to an escape pod floating in the middle of the ocean.


	6. Day Six: Friends to Lovers

"What are your intentions towards my brother?"

The voice comes from behind Cassian. He stops and turns to see Jyn Erso standing only a few feet away from him. How she got that close on crutches without him noticing is a mystery to Cassian.

(It might, perhaps, be an effect of his preoccupation this morning with thoughts of Bodhi and him, together, finally and belatedly celebrating their victory. But he's not about to admit that to anyone but himself.)

"I don't know what you're talking about," he says.

She raises an eyebrow as she hobbles a few steps closer. How she got _across the shatterdome_ on a broken leg and cracked ribs and still suffering the effects of dehydration and malnutrition speaks to a strength Cassian doesn't quite comprehend.

"Really?" she says. "You know there are no secrets in the drift."

Cassian feels a moment of blinding, horrified panic as he realizes what Erso is implying.

"You saw?!" he says in a strangled voice. He mind flashes back and he hopes the blush at the thought that Erso saw _that_ isn't visible on his cheeks.

"Saw? No," she says. "Ghost drift isn't _that_ strong, thank the gods."

He would be relieved except for the vicious smile she wears.

"Felt?" she continues. "Yes."

Erso's smile widens.

"I imagine I'll see it the next time Bodhi and I drift though," she says.

Cassian barely suppresses the urge to bury his face in his face in his hands.

He hadn't even _thought_ about the access the drift would give a Jaeger pilot to their partner's relationship. Oh, he knew he and Bodhi would have to tell Erso about their relationship eventually. But he hadn't realized there wouldn't actually _be_ a need to tell her.

"So," Erso says, and Cassian drags his attention back to her. The last thing he needs is to be distracted in the face of a woman who senses weakness like a hunting jungle cat.

"What are your intentions towards my brother?" Erso says.

"I believe that is a conversation for me to have with _Bodhi_ ," Cassian says cautiously.

Erso nods. "Oh you're _absolutely_ going to have that conversation with Bodhi," she says. "But you're also going to have it with me. Because if I have to witness you break my brother's heart, you'd best believe I'm going to hunt you down."

"And beat me to death with a shovel?" he asks, remembering the traditional American threat. "Which you will then use to bury me?"

Her smile widens. It no longer looks much like a smile — more like a predator baring their teeth in a silent promise to devour you.

"I wouldn't need the shovel," she says.

Cassian believes her.

There's an intensity in her eyes that catches his attention. Though her tone is deliberately light and her smile never vanishes, he can see the lingering darkness and wildness in her eyes. Jyn Erso is a woman who's gone beyond the edges of the world and seen monsters no other human has ever — or will ever — see and the experience has profoundly changed her.

A shiver goes down Cassian's spine.

"I don't intend to ever hurt Bodhi," he says seriously, abandoning any pretense of teasing or dissembling. "I intend to cherish him and support him in the way that he deserves."

He's not normally a man to say such things out loud. Not unless he's pushed. But Erso is the kind of woman who pushes.

And Cassian feels somehow lighter and more solid having admitted out loud the depth of his feelings for Bodhi.

Erso narrows her eyes at him. There's a long moment of silence in which she judges him.

Cassian feels stripped down to his very spirit. It's not a comfortable feeling.

"Tell him that," she says finally.

Cassian can only nod.

She nods back, firm and decisive.

"Good talk," she says, voice suddenly light.

She takes a hand off her crutches to lay a pat on Cassian's shoulder that feels more like a punch, then hobbles away without waiting for his reply.


End file.
